


The Twentieth Annual Afterglow Christmas Party

by TheShinySword



Category: BanG Dream! (Anime), BanG Dream! Girl's Band Party! (Video Game)
Genre: (s), 1 part fluff 9 parts Afterglow Shenanigans, Aged Up, Christmas is for dummies, Comedy, Everything is GREAT in your mid-twenties AU, F/F, Mentions of alcohol, Romantic Comedy, proposal
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-25
Updated: 2019-12-25
Packaged: 2021-02-24 15:48:43
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,773
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21960457
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheShinySword/pseuds/TheShinySword
Summary: Sayo is determined to pop the question at The Twentieth Annual Afterglow Christmas Party but she's not the only one with a good idea.
Relationships: Aoba Moca/Mitake Ran, Hazawa Tsugumi/Hikawa Sayo, Minor or Background Relationship(s), Udagawa Tomoe/Uehara Himari
Comments: 13
Kudos: 127





	The Twentieth Annual Afterglow Christmas Party

**Author's Note:**

> When I started writing this no one had posted any SayoTsugu Christmas stories and now everyone has so the real lesson of Christmas is I am extraordinarily basic. I can promise that my story is definitely the dumbest!

If Moca was to be believed the first nine Afterglow Christmas Parties were where the real excitement had happened. The proceeding ten had plenty of merry joy and the sort of drama that followed the close friends but none could beat Afterglow drag racing Santa Claus through Tokyo to win back Ran’s place on the Nice List. Sayo had been told some variation on ‘Afterglow Saves Christmas’ every year for ten Christmases now and while she was positive Moca had never “popped a sledie (sled wheelie) so sick Santa had to retire in shame” (and certainly not when she was seven) the story and its telling had become part of her Christmas Eve tradition. And even if the ten Christmas parties that followed the original nine lacked that “rad flavor”, each been an event to behold.

Early in their relationship, practically before they were truly dating, Tsugumi had warned Sayo they would never be able to spend Christmas Eve alone. The guitarist thought she understood how important Tsugumi’s friends were to her girlfriend but she had yet to realize dating Afterglow’s keyboardist meant dating the rest of the band too.

Sayo’s first Christmas party, Afterglow’s Tenth Annual, started at a suspiciously stilted pace. For about an hour Ran tried to start a lively conversation about the weather while Moca and Himari kept holding their pinkies out while drinking soda. It became apparent about halfway through the party that Tsugumi had begged her friends to behave and they were just trying their best. When Sayo assured them they didn’t have to put on a show for her sake, Tomoe had promptly tried to deck Ran (affectionately?) and the night ended in a touch of light arson (promptly put out by Tsugumi and Sayo, it was oddly romantic). Things were never boring around Afterglow.

At the Eleventh Annual Afterglow Christmas Party the band was forced to expand their guest list. Once she found out Sayo was permitted to join, Ako spent the entire year demanding entry into the apparently exclusive party. Tomoe relented and Ako (and Rinko, of course) were allowed to join. Moca pointed out if half of Roselia was present it was weird to exclude the other half so Yukina and Lisa found themselves dragged into the mix as well. Somewhere in the night Ran decided there was no way she could pass up an opportunity to challenge Yukina, and Yukina decided there was no way she could back down and thirty minutes later the police politely reminded them that, lovely as their duet was, blasting ‘Grandma Got Run Over By a Reindeer” in the middle of the night was a noise hazard.

The rest of Roselia did not return the following year.

During the twelfth Christmas, Moca, sick of their coy flirting, locked Tomoe and Himari in the bathroom until they admitted their feelings for one another. Sayo stood guard reluctantly. On the thirteenth, Himari, sick of their passive aggressive flirting, locked Moca and Ran in the bathroom. Sayo stood guard enthusiastically. Tsugumi apologized for letting her friends waste Sayo’s Christmas Eve—twice—but Sayo just smiled softly and reminded Tsugumi that her family, eclectic as they were, was Sayo’s family. It was an hour before Moca and Ran emerged wearing each other’s clothes but by then Sayo and Tsugumi had already retreated home.

Nobody remembered the Fourteenth Annual Afterglow Christmas Party. Moca brought a small country’s GDP worth of spiked eggnog and snuck it in with the regular stuff. Unfortunately, Tomoe, Ran and Himari did as well. The next morning, Tomoe and Himari found themselves on the beach of Inoshima in full fur coats. Ran awoke clinging to two heads of cabbage and followed a third to find Moca curled around a dutch oven (owned by no one) filled with the uncooked ingredients for a lovely beef stew. Sayo and Tsugumi, for their part, woke up in bed with a statue of Colonel Sanders and promptly swore to never discuss it again.

Somewhere between the fourteenth and the fifteenth parties Ran and Moca broke up. The following two parties were marked mostly by the increasingly tall and blonde girlfriends they both brought along to everyone’s chagrin and each other’s jealousy. During the seventeenth party the others explained the situation to the latest model of blondes and Tomoe (with Sayo’s help) physically forced Moca and Ran into romantic reconciliation. According to the Christmas cards they sent each year, the blondes were still very happy together too.

Sayo wasn’t at the eighteenth or the nineteenth parties. Roselia had begun constant touring, and people demanded music on Christmas. She spent those parties up either too late at night or too early in the morning, huddled in the corner of this or that international hotel trying to keep a steady signal on her video call so she could just see her girlfriend’s face. Only for Tsugumi to remain agonizingly out of shot for the entire night. Sayo could tell you the specific of Moca’s sweater that year (a criss-cross pattern made up odd, festive yellow pill shaped men) but she had no memory of Tsugumi’s face. The following year, Sayo came just short of begging Tsugumi to turn the camera around. And Tsugumi did but it didn’t quite help and the waver in Tsugumi’s last “I miss you” and the tears she failed at hiding made Sayo swear she’d never miss another year.

And now here they all were at the Twentieth Annual Afterglow Christmas Party. Sure some of their hair was a bit longer (Tsugumi, Ran, Moca), some of their hair was a lot shorter (Tomoe, Himari, Sayo) and they were all a lot older but the friendship still going strong and the spirit of the whole thing going far beyond both. To celebrate the twentieth Afterglow had invited practically everyone they’d ever met to join in. Tsugumi, Sayo and Himari (and Moca on a technicality) had spent the better part of the day transforming the shop into a festive wonderland (and hiding anything breakable). Looping chains of red and green paper still hung through the rafters, though much more elegantly crafted than in years prior, but those were joined by hand crafted snowflakes dangling over the festive center pieces Ran’s students hand provided though with an unusual amount of fake fruit for ikebana, and a tasty spread of every imaginable winter treat on the cafe’s countertop. At Himari’s insistence mistletoe hung in three strategic locations, ready to catch unwitting guests in its trap. At Moca’s insistence there were three bars set up in strategic locations, ready to catch unwitting guests in her clutches. To Moca’s delight, Tomoe arrived with an extra barrel of sake from the izakaya she worked at and Ran came in with half a dozen bottles of wine from grateful housewives turned students. Sayo quietly hid half of the bottles away.

Everyone they’d ever met had squeezed into the coffeeshop. Even Santa Claus made an appearance (Tae in a fluffy white beard. “She just likes to wear it,” Arisa offered in lieu of explanation before running off to stop her wife from eating a plastic fruit centerpiece). To no one’s surprise, Hina and Aya arrived an hour late. Aya immediately burst into an apology while Hina just grinned, her long hair held back in a cute but crooked braid that was one hundred precent Aya’s work. Sayo would deny all day long that Hina’s choice to grow her hair out had anything to do with Sayo’s sudden choice to cut her own hair off. It was just practical to have short hair on the road and if it kept her from looking like the star of Netflix’ ‘Boppin’ Round the World with Hina Hikawa’ that was a lovely unexpected bonus. But she was glad to have her twin here.

Sayo was glad to have everyone here. It seemed every person she cared about was in this one room, with the person she the most about at the center of it all.

Tsugumi hardly had a moment to enjoy the party buzzing from person to person playing the perfect hostess. But even in the middle of catching up with Eve and offering Maya a jaunty gingerbread man she scanned the room until her brown eyes found Sayo’s green ones. It was just a brief glance, but it was enough to keep the smiles on their faces and light Sayo’s heart on fire.

If only she could get that heart to pound a little quieter.

Sayo was desperately glad to be part of the organizing side. She needed keep her mind off the small box in her pocket and the plan she’d already failed at three times. It really shouldn’t be this hard to propose to her girlfriend of _ten_ years. Sayo had tried to pop the question three times already: on Tsugumi’s birthday, their anniversary and even a random Tuesday in an attempt take the pressure off. But each time she fumbled it or pivoted the critical kneel into tying her shoelaces or just flat out panicked and the box stayed in her pocket.

But she could do it this time. Sayo just had to find a quiet moment and the courage to ask the question.

“Will you marry me?”

Exactly that question was the one—hold on hold on hold on that wasn’t Sayo’s voice, Sayo thought. She spun on her heels into someone else’s love story.

There was Tomoe on one knee, open ring box in hand, kneeling in front of Himari with the light dazzling perfectly off the diamond in the box. All their friends and relations gasping pleasant surprise in the background. It was the perfect picture of a proposal. And they would have the perfect picture of this proposal as Tsugumi hovered in the background, phone in hand, trying to capture the ideal angle.

Sayo had long stopped believing she was born cursed but suddenly the idea didn’t seem so preposterous any more. Part of her longed to yell out how unfair it was, if anyone was going to get engaged at The Twentieth Annual Afterglow Christmas Party it should be the couple who’d been together the longest! Whether intentional or not Tomoe had—

“Wow~ This was supposed to be Moca-chan’s big day~.”

Sayo (and every other body in the room) turned to watch Moca emerge from the crowd half-empty wine glass in one hand, blue ring box in the other. She staggered forward her mischievous grin plastered permanently on her face.

“Moca! No! This is my moment! I didn’t even say yes yet!” Himari cried. But it was too late, Moca had fallen (a little painfully) to one knee in front of her mortified girlfriend.

“Moca...” Ran hissed between tight lips.

“Let’s get hitched baby! Christmas is for lovers!”

“You want to get married right _now_ ,” Ran sighed. “We can’t do that.”

“But we can get married?” Moca shuffled forward, pressing the box into Ran’s sternum.

“...I guess.” Ran took the box in her hands and—“This is a ring pop.”

“I didn’t even get to say yes and you gave Ran a RING POP!” Himari stomped.

Tsugumi pivoted between the bickering couples, her phone catching every detail of the drama. The video was sure to become the main attraction at the every Christmas party to come. If everyone survived this one.

Tomoe groaned from the ground, “Babe can you say yes my knee’s dying here?”

“It’s important to share the love Hii-chan,” Moca chided.

“Does anyone else want to get engaged?” Himari exasperatedly raised up her arms and called out to the crowd. “While we’re all doing it?” Sayo swore Himari winked.

“Perhaps the call of destiny has taken your shape tonight Himari,” Kaoru stepped out of the crowd. “I can hide my heart no longer, on this eve of Christmas the anniversary of Santa’s own birth. Chisato, like a curmudgeonly green mutant my own heart grows no less than three times… in… your… p-presence…”

There was no way Kaoru could see the look of tranquil fury on Chisato’s face but from the way sweat began to pour from her paling forehead she knew all the same. “Excuse us for a moment,” Chisato said in a sickly sweet voice as she dragged Kaoru away by the tie.

“Oh god, this is it. I’m collapsing, goodbye friends.” THUD! Tomoe collapsed to the ground.

“Tomoe!” Himari hurriedly fell to the ground and massaged Tomoe’s worn knee.

Even for an Afterglow Christmas spectacular, this was a lot. Sayo needed some air and judging from the frazzled look in Tsugumi’s eyes, her girlfriend needed one too. Sayo caught Tsugumi’s attention and nodded towards the door.

“Tomo-chin always skips leg day...”

Outside, hints of snow fell from the sky. The snowfall was so light if you looked up at the sky you couldn’t quite tell flakes from stars. The storm would come in later, the weather report had warned, but for now it was calm, it was quiet. Sayo leaned on the railing outside the cafe. It was just about perfect.

“Sayo-san.”

It was perfect.

“Tsugumi-san,” Sayo shuffled along the rail to make room for Tsugumi. They’d used honorifics for so long they practically pet names. There was deep affection in the affectation of formality.

Tsugumi’s hand slipped into Sayo’s, where it always belonged. The brunette laughed, a little amused, a little exhausted, “Do you think we’ll ever have just a normal Christmas party?”

“I’ve only ever been to your parties. I think this is our normal.” Sayo rubbed the silver clasp of the box in her pocket with her other hand. She’d touched it so much throughout the night it was still warm. Logically, it was completely out of the question to propose on the same night that not one but two other couples had gotten engaged. But logic had never really applied to Afterglow, had it?

“Tsugumi.” “Sayo.”

They called out in soft voices simultaneously to each other. Sayo motioned for Tsugumi to continue. With a comfortably embarrassed glance down, Tsugumi reached into her purse and retrieved a small, stout box. She placed it on the railing and slid it to the space between them.

Ten years in and they were still fools in love. In a slow deliberate motion, Sayo drew out the box she’d been fingering all night and set it beside its pair.

“Yes,” they both answered the unasked question in perfect synchronicity.

They came together with the quiet love of ten years. A tight embrace and a soft kiss and—their four favorite fools crashing out the door way into a messy heap on the ground.

“Sup,” Moca saluted, lying upside down on the pavement with Himari’s knee lodged in her stomach. She grunted as Himari used her as a stepping stool to jump up.

“I TOLD you guys this was a great idea!” Himari pointed accusingly at her apparently coconspirators. “They’re engaged!”

“H-Himari-chan,” Tsugumi turned in Sayo’s arms. “What did you do?”

Ran brushed the snow off her front, “They already had rings. I told you we didn’t need to do this.”

“Where’s your sense of romance?” Moca scolded, still on the ground.

“You gave me a ring pop.”

“The real ring had to get resized~. You have chunky fingers~.”

“The… real ring…” Sayo repeated. She was starting to piece the puzzle together. “When did you two get engaged?”

Ran sighed. “…I asked Moca two weeks ago.”

“Moca-chan said maybe and then she thought about it and then she said yes.”

“Moca cried.”

Moca Aoba was finally driven silent.

“Himari-chan,” Tsugumi said with a light warning in her voice, “when did Tomoe propose?”

“T-two weeks ago too.”

“Himari-chan.”

“On my birthday…”

Sayo’s mouth fell open. “In October?”

“It didn’t seem fair for us to get engaged first!” Himari hurriedly said, “We thought Sayo would propose so we just waited… and then she didn’t. So we figured with a little encouragement she might get swept up and just do it. Right Tomoe?” They all turned their attention to Tomoe, curled up on the ground around her knee.

“I can’t… move…”

“I’ll call a cab,” Tsugumi said, pulling out her phone.

Sayo smiled despite herself as her Tsugumi left to rescue Tomoe. This was more familiar, a perfect moment surrounded by increasing absurdity. “Afterglow ditching our own party to go to the hospital? It’ll be a story worth retelling.”

“Heh heh,” Moca chuckled, “you included yourself in there didn’t you?”

Sayo popped open the precious present Tsugumi had left her and slipped the gold band inside onto her finger. “I suppose I’m a member by marriage.”

What would the next ten Christmas parties bring?

**Author's Note:**

> Did I have two ideas and just sort of squished them together? Yes. Did I not plan to write anything for Christmas and then sort of go into a fugue state when I remembered Afterglow has Christmas parties? Yes. Do I want to write out every single one of their terrible parties? Yes. Is my favorite non-height related head-canon that Afterglow adopts Sayo as their own awkward sixth pal when she dates Tsugumi? 100% absolutely, look at these dorks.
> 
> Merry Christmas, Happy Holidays, it's been a pleasure writing for ya'll these few months. 
> 
> You can find me on twitter @theshinysword


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